


if i love you; is that a fact or a weapon?

by burnshoney



Category: RWBY
Genre: F/F, F/M, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Love Confessions, Past Jaune Arc/Pyrrha Nikos, Volume 8 (RWBY), listen twitter made me do it i'm sorry, my prediction for v8e9
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-10
Updated: 2021-02-10
Packaged: 2021-03-17 01:27:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,348
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29342055
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/burnshoney/pseuds/burnshoney
Summary: “Do...you wish you told her? Before we left?”Ren’s eyes find hers. "Of course,” he murmurs. “Do you wish you told Blake?"
Relationships: Blake Belladonna/Yang Xiao Long, Lie Ren/Nora Valkyrie
Comments: 19
Kudos: 172





	if i love you; is that a fact or a weapon?

**Author's Note:**

  * For [gayxiaolong](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gayxiaolong/gifts).



> pairing ren and jaune, who have had/currently have canonical romances involving their partners with yang who is yearning for hers was NOT a coincidence on crwby's part. you can't change my mind. now let them bond over it, cowards, before you make their respective partners believe they're d!ed in the whale trying to save oscar
> 
> (title from [we are hard](https://readalittlepoetry.wordpress.com/2011/05/11/we-are-hard-by-margaret-atwood/) by margaret atwood)

The air is heavy, pushing down on them, thick enough it almost hurts to swallow and Yang knows it isn’t just from the humidity that’s making her hair stick to her neck. They’re all on high alert, pulled taut like a string about to break, and the silence weighs untouched between them. 

Yang knows when it snaps, the ends will be frayed.

She glances at her teammates. Winter had kept her promise — had dropped the three of them as close to Salem’s whale before retreating with a mournful, final warning about the incoming bomb. _If you’re not out, we blow it,_ her voice rattles around in Yang’s head and her nails press tighter into her palms until she’s certain there are half-moons left in the wake.

Every step further into the whale, every empty chamber they come across is just another tick on the clock that’s counting down to zero. They’re living — and dying — on borrowed time.

They’ve just turned a corner, Jaune waving them forward silently after he’s made sure the corridor is clear when Ren breaks the silence that’s been squeezing at Yang’s throat until tears had floated in the bottom of her vision. “I...I’m sorry.”

It’s so quiet of a confession that if they hadn’t been completely silent, Yang knows the two of them would’ve missed it. They’ve all been completely quiet up until this point, hyper-aware of their situation and the futility of getting out alive while still fighting to rescue Oscar in an undertaking that seems more like a suicide mission the deeper they go. A funeral march with every breath, every heel meeting ground that seems to shift beneath them like the contracting walls. A reminder of the living being they’re inside.

“Me too.”

Jaune’s halted a half-step in front of Yang and Ren. He doesn’t turn, doesn’t stray his gaze from the long passageway they’re in, but his voice softens. Yang watches Ren, hunched shoulders, making her teammate look much smaller than he is.

“I think we all are,” she murmurs and her voice seems to echo. Sighing, Yang closes her eyes for a split-second before opening. “I never expected we’d end up here.”

Ren’s chuckle is barely an expulsion of air. “None of us did.”

“You were right. We got in way over our heads.”

Before Yang’s even finished, Jaune is shaking his head. “You’re acting like we’ve already lost; we’re here, aren’t we? We never expected any of this, yeah, but we rose to meet it. I think-” he hesitates, trips over his own tongue, and Yang catches how his hand tightens around the hilt of his sword. The gold glints lowly in the dim, shaded lighting that’s filtering in through the walls. Outside, they can hear the rumbling of the whale, explosions as Grimm rip through Atlas’ airships like paper soldiers without mercy, their own laborious breaths. “-I think that’s what matters in the end. That we kept moving forward.”

Yang hums her agreement even as her heart both falls further into the pit of her hollow stomach while climbing up her throat to make it difficult to breathe. Jaune moves forward, motioning to the chamber to their right; Yang nods.

Silence falls between them again. They’ve ventured deep enough now they can’t hear anything from the outside; the walls still move and shift with every step and they have to duck into adjoining hallways when Seers float by. The incandescent eerie glow that seems to come from the walls themselves cast shadows that put them more on-edge, warping their perception and making everyone hold their weapons a little closer, a little higher.

Ren hangs his head after he’s cleared yet another chamber, empty of their youngest teammate. They share a glance — Yang is surprised by how open his eyes are. Usually, he’s the quietest and hardest to read of them all, walls build up every which way, but his heart is bared on his sleeve and held out for slaughter.

She touches his shoulder, not surprised at how he flinches. “Ren?”

“Nora kissed me. The night of Robyn’s victory rally, before...before Tyrian.” It spills out of him like holding it in hurts, like he’s begging to be free of the admission. His voice dips to almost a whisper. “I kissed her back.”

Yang blinks. She sees Jaune stop, turn, surprised as he looks at her before looking at Ren. His hair that’s come undone from the long braid that falls down his back hangs around his cheeks, blocking him from view, and Yang thinks the tense line of his shoulders could be a tightrope.

A balancing act, indeed. She can see him wobbling and wonders if there’s a net below to catch him — to catch _any_ of them.

Jaune’s face settles into melancholy understanding. “Then everything happened, and we split up.”

Without looking at either of them, Ren nods. 

“You two didn’t talk. After.” It’s not a question, rather a statement. Yang’s voice surprises even her; rough and flat, almost lifeless. Somehow, she just _knows._

Lifting his head, Ren stares at the ceiling. Yang watches him closely, curiosity and something like kinship bubbling up inside her as she opens her mouth before closing it a few times. Jaune is staring at Ren indiscernibly. 

Ren beats her to it. “I love her.”

She feels like she’s just been stabbed. There’s an unspoken revelation hanging between them, something that binds them all together, much more intimate than their teams or battles won together. It runs through their bloodstream, stands by their side throughout it all; Yang remembers Ruby’s voice as she talked about Jaune on the road to Haven, his weapon.

 _Love,_ it feels like when Yang swallows thickly. _Loss._

“Do...you wish you told her? Before we left?”

Ren’s eyes find hers. For a moment, Yang feels trapped, like she’s drowning in his rose-colored tide. _Her_ resonates in her chest, echoing, yearning. It’s a name. 

It’s a name to both of them. Different, yet the same.

"Of course,” Ren murmurs. It’s the most somber she’s ever seen him as if he’s steeping in the regret. She wonders if he’s spent every moment since rueing this longing that slices through him now, fueled by the imminency of what they’re doing. What they may never come back from. “Do you wish you told Blake?"

It’s habit, how her hackles raise at the name. _Blake._ Out of the corner of her eye, Yang sees Jaune’s gaze whip to her, shock coloring his features. She doesn’t meet it though, simply holding Ren’s look instead. His head is cocked slightly to the side, tone seeking to understand instead of accuse.

He’s asking a question wordlessly. _You too?_

Yang’s shoulders fall. There’s a bittersweet taste on her tongue that’s equal parts victory and defeat. _“Yeah._ All the time.”

“Jaune?” 

Their third teammate is staring down at his hands as if in a trance. The red of the sash around his waist is the same as the knotted purple ribbon around Yang’s knee, Ren’s bracer flashing pink around the lining next to his neck and on the underside of his arm. They’ve all been here before; all of them standing on different lookouts on the same mountain.

Yang thinks Jaune’s summit must be painful in a way she hopes she’ll never know.

“We should move,” Jaune whispers, “but _yes_. I think I always will.”

Neither one realizes they’ve moved until they’re both behind Jaune, one hand on each shoulder. Yang shoots Ren a look; she gets a half-smile in return that she mirrors sadly. Jaune exhales and they all continue down the corridor again, the leader of JNOR in front again.

Yang turns the corner and thinks she hears Jaune breathe, _Get them back._ She’s opening her mouth, confused, almost fearful of the meaning burrowed deep in those three words when Ren stops dead beside her. Both she and Jaune turn just in time before a single scream echoes down the corridor to catch how Ren’s lips form a name before he takes off running.

_Oscar._

They're coming. They're running out of time.

**Author's Note:**

> I BLAME THIS ON REN (gayxiaolong) ENTIRELY. COME YELL WITH ME ABOUT HOW EP9 IS GONNA DESTROY US ALL ON MY TWT (EMBERSCELlCA)


End file.
